The government’s apparently insatiable appetite for foreign exchange, which has led it engage in $4.5 billion fresh borrowing so far this fiscal year, not yet half over, including $1.1 billion in expensive commercial loans, last month, have led it become so desperate for the next IMF tranche, that it has agreed to a power price hike it had previously rejected as politically unacceptable. While nothing has changed on the political front so as to make the proposed hike more acceptable, the government’s need for foreign exchange seems to have increased. The looming of a bullet repayment of $2 billion to the UAE is coming, which means that the pursuit of foreign exchange will continue.
These borrowings are not project loans from development institutions, which mean that projects will be carried out which will ultimately result in the ability to repay through increased tax revenue, and which are often given at concessional rates. They are straight-up commercial loans, which are made at high interest rates, and without a thought to where the money will go. The government’s appetite for such funds reflects not just poor economic management, but poor diplomacy. The impending UAE repayment is a case in point, but the Saudi withdrawal successively of $2 billion in deposits from the State Bank of Pakistan illustrate the problem. The deposits were made for political reasons, and were withdrawn because of political reasons. After encashing the goodwill created by years of diplomacy, this government could not avoid offending Saudi Arabia to the extent that it withdrew its deposits.
That Saudi withdrawal forced the government to accept the power tariff hike, which will get the IMF to revive its Extended Fund Facility, suspended for noncompliance, even though it will be inflationary for consumers, and suppressive of growth and employment. It forces a comparison with the previous government, which so managed its own IMF package that it completed the programme and fulfilled the conditions without complaint. The present government had come to power by claiming greater economic competence, and vowing never to go to the IMF. If it had to go to the IMF, did its failure to meet its admittedly onerous conditions represent that greater competence?
https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/12/19/economy-in-trouble-2/
Economy in trouble: Editorial in Pakistan Today, Dec 19, 2020
The government’s apparently insatiable appetite for foreign exchange, which has led it engage in $4.5 billion fresh borrowing so far this fiscal year, not yet half over, including $1.1 billion in expensive commercial loans, last month, have led it become so desperate for the next IMF tranche, that it has agreed to a power price hike it had previously rejected as politically unacceptable. While nothing has changed on the political front so as to make the proposed hike more acceptable, the government’s need for foreign exchange seems to have increased. The looming of a bullet repayment of $2 billion to the UAE is coming, which means that the pursuit of foreign exchange will continue.
These borrowings are not project loans from development institutions, which mean that projects will be carried out which will ultimately result in the ability to repay through increased tax revenue, and which are often given at concessional rates. They are straight-up commercial loans, which are made at high interest rates, and without a thought to where the money will go. The government’s appetite for such funds reflects not just poor economic management, but poor diplomacy. The impending UAE repayment is a case in point, but the Saudi withdrawal successively of $2 billion in deposits from the State Bank of Pakistan illustrate the problem. The deposits were made for political reasons, and were withdrawn because of political reasons. After encashing the goodwill created by years of diplomacy, this government could not avoid offending Saudi Arabia to the extent that it withdrew its deposits.
That Saudi withdrawal forced the government to accept the power tariff hike, which will get the IMF to revive its Extended Fund Facility, suspended for noncompliance, even though it will be inflationary for consumers, and suppressive of growth and employment. It forces a comparison with the previous government, which so managed its own IMF package that it completed the programme and fulfilled the conditions without complaint. The present government had come to power by claiming greater economic competence, and vowing never to go to the IMF. If it had to go to the IMF, did its failure to meet its admittedly onerous conditions represent that greater competence?
https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/12/19/economy-in-trouble-2/
Published in Pak Media comment and Pakistan